Steve Reicher - Guest Lecture

Collectivity and individuality: on the psychology and the politics of a false duality

Networking | Public lectures

Psychology reflects a society which is fundamentally anti-collectivistic. In multiple ways we are told that people are diminished in the group and their autonomy within the mass and are reduced to the level of herd animals.

In this talk Steve will argue that this view is profoundly wrong. He will examine the psychological transformations that occur when people see themselves as group members and will propose that, far from being diminished as human beings, our self-realisation as human subjects can only be fully accomplished in and through the group.

Event details

Lecture Details

Psychology reflects a society which is fundamentally anti-collectivistic. In multiple ways we are told that people are diminished in the group both intellectually and morally. Above all, people lose their agency and their autonomy within the mass and are reduced to the level of herd animals.

In this talk Steve will argue that this view is profoundly wrong and derives from elite fears of popular power. He will examine the psychological transformations that occur when people see themselves as group members and will propose that, far from being diminished as human beings, our self-realisation as human subjects can only be fully accomplished in and through the group.

Biography

Stephen (Steve) Reicher is a world-leader in the field of group processes and collective behaviour. His PhD research with Henri Tajfel reformulated the social psychological understanding of crowd behaviour and his published work has also encompassed the psychology of nationalism and national identity, leadership and political rhetoric, intergroup hatred, and the psychology of tyranny and obedience.

Steve's research has been funded by the Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC), the Leverhulme Foundation and the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC). His former doctoral students include leading UK social psychologists including Fabio Sani, Nick Hopkins, Clifford Stott and John Drury.

Steve is Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh, a Fellow of the British Academy, and a Fellow of the Academy of Social Sciences. He is a Scientific Consultant to Scientific American Mind and is a former editor of the British Journal of Social Psychology. He is currently Wardlaw Professor of Psychology at the University of St. Andrews.